Heimr
by Miss Mungoe
Summary: They reunite below the gilded ceilings of Odin's hall. – Stoick/Valka.


AN: So I watched HTTYD2 and spent the last half-hour of the film sobbing into my popcorn – this is me putting my feelings into words, so excuse the shameless wish-fulfillment, guys, though I'm not all that sorry.

**Warning**: there are SPOILERS for How To Train Your Dragon 2, and a slew of obscure norse names.

Disclaimer: the How To Train Your Dragon franchise is property of Dreamworks, and the book series is property of Cressida Cowell; I own absolutely nothing.

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**Heimr **

by Miss Mungoe

It's years before she sees him again.

She knows it's time already before it happens, one quiet evening in that time during the winter season just before the grip of the northern cold loosens its hold enough to let spring thaw the ice around Berk. She sits by the dying light of an old fire, hair silver-white with her years and her bones no longer the hard steel of youth but fragile, soft like the smouldering embers of the hearth.

And it's in this rare respite from the running feet of grandchildren and dragonlings alike, when the eternal halls of Valhalla finally welcome her home.

There's a quiet sort of grace about it, Valka decides, but then that's always suited her better than a viking's glorious death in battle. She goes in her sleep, drawn quietly from her doze by gently tugging hands, leading her from her armchair by the firepit and to the revered hall of the slain with a care she'd not expected, though her bones are no longer brittle and there's a new fire in her soul like a naked flame, urging her to pick up her feet and run like the girl she'd once been. Old injuries fade even as she walks, passing the void between here and there, aching bones and joints like new, and there is joy in her heart fresh and unwearied, and she wonders at the change.

There are no Valkyries heralding her arrival, and for the span of a moment – a decade, a century, _a millennia it feels _– Valka is afraid her pleas have not been heard, that she will not be seeing Odin's gilded hall but someplace else – Fólkvangr, perhaps, or Helheimr, but surely the gods would not be so cruel?

Her panic rises, builds and roils within her, but then she hears it, not the cry of a Valkyrie but another sound, the whistle like a singing note on the wind, an echo in a grand hall that_ cannot be anywhere else_.

And then she _is_ running like a girl, her mane grey-no-longer but wild and dark with eternal life as she follows the sound with her heart, the familiar tune a hum in her breast pressing ever upward, as though about to burst from her chest like sunlight. The words are at the tip of her tongue– _I'll swim and sail on savage seas with ne'er a fear of __**drowning**__–_ but she can't speak past the lump in her throat, her heart light like it hasn't been since she was last astride Cloudjumper, and it's been years since her old friend passed on to wherever old drakes go at the end of their lives.

The old gods have granted her wish and her gratitude is gold upon her tongue as she passes faces old and familiar – Gobber, whose smile follows in her wake along with his laughter, but it's _his_ she seeks upon her swift feet, his face and his grin, her eyes searching for the sunset red of his hair like she'd so often scoured the horizon for the sails of his ship.

She does not have to look long to find him. And he's proud and wide and _vast_ indeed like a king, gilded in a finery they hadn't had the means to send him off with. And his smile is wider still, ever vaster than his infamous girth and crinkling the corners of eyes forever young and bright with mirth and pride and _love_ – the kind of love that defies the separation of death and by Odin's beard, even Hel herself could not tear them apart _now_, Valka thinks. And at once she's a girl in spirit as well as body, running towards him like she had that bright spring morning upon his return to Berk from a long voyage, when they'd been married but a year and her stomach had been heavy with their son.

Her joy is the open sky and sea and his the embrace of the earth underfoot, solid and safe to a heart that has so long belonged to the wind and the freedom of the open world, and she burrows her wild roots firmly in the grin pressing against her throat. The rumble of his laughter is a battle-drum in her soul, low and warm against the steel hard wicker-work of her ribcage.

_I only want your hand to hold–_

"Welcome _home_, Val."

And she _laughs_, and it's a new morning in a never-ending day under curving ceilings forever etched with their lives and their hearts and the song of their love.

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AN: Normally, only those that die in battle go to Valhalla or Fólkvangr, but Valka is charming enough to land a deal with one of the big guys. I mean c'mon, even Odin's got to have a heart for these two.


End file.
